Prepared in cooperation with the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection

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Abstract

Water levels in 722 wells in the Coastal Plain of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and northeastern Delaware were measured during October and November 1993 and were used to define the potentiometric surface of the eight major confined aquifers of the area. Isochlors (lines of equal chloride concentration) for 250 and 10,000 milligrams per liter are included to show the extent of freshwater in each of the aquifers. Estimated water withdrawals from the eight major confined aquifers are reported for 1978-94. Water-withdrawal and water-level maps including isochlors were constructed for the Cohansey aquifer of Cape May County, the Atlantic City 800-foot sand, the Piney Point aquifer, the Wenonah-Mount Laurel aquifer, the Englishtown aquifer system, the Upper Potomac-Raritan-Magothy, the Middle and undifferentiated Potomac-Raritan-Magothy, and the Lower Potomac-Raritan-Magothy aquifers.
From 1988 to 1993, water levels near the center of the large cones of depression in the Middlesex-Monmouth County area rose as much as 120 ft in the Wenonah-Mount Laurel aquifer and Englishtown aquifer system, 40 ft in the Upper Potomac-Raritan-Magothy aquifer, and 96 ft in the Middle and undifferentiated Potomac-Raritan-Magothy aquifers. Large cones of depression in the potentiometric surface of aquifers of the Potomac-Raritan-Magothy aquifer system in the Burlington-Camden-Gloucester area remained at about the same altitude; that is, the potentiometric surface neither rose nor fell in the aquifers by more than 5 feet. In the same area, water levels in the Englishtown aquifer system were static, whereas the water levels in the Wenonah-Mount Laurel aquifer declined 5 to 20 feet, forming an expanded cone of depression. Water levels in the Cohansey, Atlantic City 800-foot sand, and Piney Point aquifers declined by 1 to 10 feet during 1988?93.

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Publication type:

Report

Publication Subtype:

USGS Numbered Series

Title:

Water levels in, extent of freshwater in, and water withdrawal from eight major confined aquifers, New Jersey Coastal Plain, 1993